


Unknown Soldier

by fabricdragon



Series: Smooth Criminal [6]
Category: James Bond (Craig movies), James Bond - All Media Types, Sherlock (TV)
Genre: Canon-Typical Violence, Drug Use, Dubious Morality, M/M, Mildly Dubious Consent, Non-Consensual Drug Use, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Rape, Rape Recovery, Suicide Attempt, really inadvisable if actually well done sexual therapy
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-12-31
Updated: 2017-01-02
Packaged: 2018-09-13 13:35:14
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 4
Words: 5,964
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9125923
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/fabricdragon/pseuds/fabricdragon
Summary: How Sebastian Moran met Jim Moriarty.Some very dark themes, and a lot of trauma. May be read independently of timeline.





	1. Dead inside

The MI6 briefing was not going well.

The older psychologists and assistant department heads looked warily at the new M.  The problem was that they knew her- she’d been a Double-O, after all- but she’d always been the one they knew the least, and now she was their boss.

“Stop trying to weed out the sociopaths, gentlemen,” M said drily, looking at the files labeled in red “Not Recommended”.

“The ideal Double-O, Ma’am, has sociopathic TENDENCIES, not full blown cases.”

M smiled at him, sharply. “You can’t tell the difference.”

“Yes, yes we can, that’s what‑“

“No, no you can’t.  You just study them- I worked with them. Some of our best were over the line.” She nodded at a file, “Pull that one in for an in-person interview.”

The psychologists looked at each other.

“That was not a suggestion,” M said. She picked up one of the files labeled in blue: “This one looks promising, but I suspect he’s too soft.”

“Soft? No one in the files is soft, Ma’am.”

“Sebastian Moran,” she said looking down at the file. “He’s too soft.  Leave him in the army; we’ll see if it burns some of the fat off of him.”

They went on to other reports, other files, no one asking how an army sniper with that many kills was “too soft”.

*

Moran loved the military.  He hated it when they were on down time‑ he ended up going into town and getting in trouble if left alone too long‑ but the rest of it? The only time he liked holding still was when he was sniping: that was alright.

His team, they were great. Great lads, all of them.  Most of them had family to go home to, unlike Sebastian. Once, when they were home for a holiday, one of the lads‑Steven‑ invited him to dinner. He had a wife, and a kid, and… a cousin who was just Moran’s type.  He made his excuses quickly and escaped to a bar.  He wouldn’t risk their relationship just because his cousin was small, cute, intelligent, and had big eyes… even if his cousin was gay, he wouldn’t risk the working relationship.

He had picked up a sweet little thing in the bar, all big glasses and long limbs, talking physics while drunk off his ass.

The water to his face brought him back to the enemy base- to the bad intel, and the dead men who would never see their families again; to having the poor luck to be one of the survivors.

He slowly got his feet back under him to take the weight off his shoulders.

“Sebastian Moran…” he started again with name, rank, serial number.

The man who had been working him over hit him again.  An unknown voice told him to stop.  The man who moved into view looked smarter, and more cold.

“Pain does not teach you to answer, Colonel. We will try something different.”

They’d shot him full of heroin-they had plenty; they dealt in it.  He spent days flying, and crashing.  Eventually he talked, begging for another shot.  Most of the information was worthless by then, of course‑information has a short shelf life in the field.

The cold man smiled as he gave him the last shot. “I told you I would break you.”

He was taken away, handed over to other men in the group, who used him as a combination punching bag and whore, but only for a short while, before the men who’d rescued him arrived.

Most of them were SAS; some were something else.  They weren’t there for him‑ just for the base, for the terrorists‑ but he was still alive then, and he woke up in a hospital ship, feeling no pain on the medical version of his addiction.

He told them he’d talked.  They were all consoling and professional, talking about therapy and trauma. They told him no one could hold out forever.  They sounded sincere.  Maybe they believed it, but Sebastian didn’t‑ he was broken, shattered, and adrift.

They discharged him, with orders to see a therapist.

He vanished into the city.  He’d gone through withdrawal before they discharged him.  He didn’t know where to find drugs in England, anyway.  He wanted to forget.

He picked up pretty intellectual men, and tried to forget, but he couldn’t.

He picked up men like the ones he might have palled around with, and let them hurt him‑ it helped for a short while, not enough.

He hurt one of the little pretty boys accidentally, and he’d run. Sebastian could have caught him, held him, forced him, but he didn’t want to‑ it had been an accident.

By this point he knew where to find drugs.  He laughed at himself for the vanity of buying a clean needle- it wasn’t going to matter.

He was walking to his flop house when the gang attacked him.  He was dull, uncaring- until they held his arms behind his back and started to punch him.  He came back to himself surrounded by dead men.  One of them had tried to draw a knife on him, and Moran had used it to end a few of them.

Dead bodies and blood.

And a bag full of heroin and a clean needle.

Sebastian slid down the wall and stared at it.  Here was as good a place as any, really.

As he was setting up the shot, a light Irish voice spoke from the end of the alley, “That dose is likely to be lethal for anyone without a tolerance.”

“What makes you think I don’t have a tolerance?” _Of course there was someone, of course there was: his luck was always awful._

“Your hands don’t shake, you have muscle tone, and you took down these boys pretty well, from the look of it.  If you were that addicted, you wouldn’t be able to.”

The man had moved into the dim light where Sebastian had been fixing his shot.  He looked like a young office worker, or a college kid, out for a stroll.  _Fuck, he even had a blazer.  Intelligent eyes, soft lips, dark hair._

Sebastian groaned, and hoped the poor kid couldn’t see his hard-on.

“Looks like you have something to live for, Tiger,” the man said, sounding amused.

“If you had a lick of sense you’d run. I’m dangerous.”

“Well, yes, the six dead men would tell me that.”

Sebastian blinked out of his fog enough to realize that the guy was standing, right there, just to the side of a pool of blood, looking unconcerned.  He pushed himself up to stand against the wall.

The man plucked the needle out of his hand, capped it expertly, and dropped it in his pocket.

“Don’t!” Sebastian almost cried.

“Tell you what:  you give me a weekend‑ better, a week‑ and if you still want to end it all? I’ll give it back.  I have faster drugs anyway.”

Warnings and confusion were hitting all his instincts.  _This guy was dangerous somehow ‑and better drugs? What?_

“Besides…” The man walked up and pulled him down into a kiss.

Sebastian’s arms wrapped around him and he growled into the man.  His hands roamed roughly over the slight figure in front of him‑ bruising, grasping‑and stopped dead at a knife in a holster.

“Hmm?”  The man panted up at him. “You stopped.”

“You’re armed.”

He smiled, “Naturally. All sorts of bad characters around this neighborhood.”

He looked back at the dead bodies.

“A week. Give  me a week.  Come on, I don’t let people fuck me in alleys. I’m Jim, by the way.”

“Sebastian.”

“That’s a nice name.  Come on.”

They went to a business nearby, and Jim let them in the back of it.  It looked ordinary.  Jim opened a door to the cold storage and pulled him in. There was a handle on the inside: they wouldn’t be locked in.

Jim smiled up at him, “Since you were planning on killing yourself anyway, I think I can dispense with the usual threats about talking.”

“What?”

Jim opened up a door behind the shelving units, and pulled Sebastian down the stairs. “Old bomb shelter,” Jim said pleasantly.

“What are you‑“

“A week.”  He pulled him past something that looked like an office, with computers, to a bedroom.  The bedroom looked strange. After blinking at it a lot, Sebastian realized it was meant to hold someone restrained, even if it didn’t look like the bed he’d been cuffed to.  He recoiled back against the wall with his knife out.

“Sebastian?”

His eyes snapped to the man who wanted to beat him and rape him, some part of him expecting muscles and swarthy skin‑ all he saw was a college kid sitting on the bed.

“Sebastian? Are you back now?”

He sagged down the wall. “No.”

Jim walked over and sat down, lowering himself into Sebastian’s lap, throat bared.  Sebastian started shaking. “Don’t, please don’t. I’ll hurt you. I won’t mean to, but I will.”

“Give me the knife?” he asked, softly, lying in his lap like a sacrificial lamb.  Sebastian handed him the knife. “Any other weapons?”

“No.  Other than being one, I suppose.”

“Sebastian… This is recent, isn’t it?”

“What?”

“Recent.  Your trauma, being raped. It’s recent.”

Sebastian stared at him. “Is it that obvious? God, no wonder they discharged me.”

“I was held down and raped; I know what it looks like.”  He said calmly, looking up at him from Sebastian’s lap. “I can help.”

 


	2. Show me what it's like

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> do NOT try anything like this kind of "therapy" at home, please.

Sebastian stared at this suicidal boffin in his lap. “If you think you can tie me down‑“

“Oh, no, not at all‑ well, not at first.  We will have to get to that, eventually‑desensitization, you know.  I rather thought you might like to hold me down, though.”

“Look, I hurt a boy, last time. I didn’t mean to, but‑“

“Hurt how?”

“Bruised him, twisted his arm too much.”

“Did you stop?”

“After I finally realized he was scared, yes.”

“Did he run?”

“Yeah.” Sebastian hung his head.

“Did you chase him?”

“NO!”

Jim smiled, wickedly, “Did you want to?”

Sebastian gasped like he’d been punched.

“But you didn’t.”

“No.  Yes, I wanted to‑ no, I didn’t.”

Jim got up and put Sebastian’s knife in a safe.  Sebastian looked up to see weapons that were in no way, shape, or form legal, including a few sniper rifles.  He was still gaping like a fish as Jim took off the knife his fingers had brushed, a small pistol, and some other things Sebastian couldn’t see well and locked them all in the safe. 

He picked up a phone. “If my guest walks out of here without me? Take him down, alive.” Jim looked back at Sebastian. “You… wouldn’t like that, trust me.”

“Who are you?”

“Jim. Right now that’s all you get.” Jim pulled him over to the bed. “Ground rules first.  You use a condom‑I haven’t got a clean lab test on you.” Sebastian nodded. “If you need help, or you think I do, there’s a panic button on the dresser over there: hit that, then lie down on the floor if you can‑ my people tend to be trigger happy.”

“But don’t go out the door,” Sebastian said, remembering what he’d said on the phone.

“Not without me, no.”

“Alright, so what now?”

“Condoms and lube are in the bedside table.” He smiled, “Now you get to hold me down and fuck me.”

“I’m not sure I’m in the mood right now, with everything.”

Jim cocked his head coquettishly, and dropped to his knees.  Sebastian had just time to go “What?” before Jim was putting a condom on him… with his mouth. Sebastian held on for a few more seconds and then threw Jim on the bed and started trying to rip clothing off him.

Jim giggled.

Sebastian grabbed Jim’s head and pushed him back toward his crotch.  Jim very expertly picked up where he left off. Sebastian felt Jim’s tongue vibrating against his shaft as Jim swallowed him down, and nearly blacked out. His hands dug into Jim’s hair, and he pulled on him, trying to get as much of himself into that wonderful mouth as he could.  Eventually, he found out it felt better when he let Jim move a bit more.  In short order, he was lying on the bed, with Jim kneeling between his knees, licking, sucking, and swallowing Sebastian.

A slick and slightly odd feeling finger slipped into his hole, and for a moment Sebastian tensed, from memories and fear, but none of them had been making love to his cock when they did that.

A finger hit a spot that Sebastian had almost forgotten existed and he screamed, cumming into Jim’s mouth.

He fell back, panting, and stared down at Jim.  He suddenly realized how rough he had been, and looked at Jim, who looked, honestly, a bit worse for wear.

“Did… did I hurt you?”

“No.” Jim smiled. “I have GOT to get you tested; I want to do that without a condom.”

“I’d like to do that without a condom.” Sebastian swore a bit under his breath. “My God, you’re an angel.”

Jim smiled, and every instinct Sebastian had said _Kill him and run_.

“No, I’m the devil, Sebastian, but only one of them‑not the worst one.” He slid up to Sebastian and giggled. “So, would you like to fuck me yet?”

“Give me a minute.” Sebastian was trying to figure out which way to go‑ what to do.

“Do I scare you that much?”

“Yeah, actually.”

“Oh good, you’re smart.”  Jim sighed and snuggled up in Sebastian’s arms. “What did you used to be?”

“Sniper, Special Forces.”

“You got caught, then.”

It was hard to be frightened with a warm body in his arms like that, especially one who had his nerves still singing praises. “Yes. When they couldn’t get anywhere with pain, they went for drugs.”

“Ah.” He nodded.

After a while he moved back down and did his mouth/condom trick again. “You get to fuck me, then it’s my turn.”

Sebastian started out carefully.  He meant to be gentle, he really did, but somehow all the violence just kept pouring out of him.  Jim never said stop.

He was slamming into Jim as hard as he could, digging his hands into Jim’s hips, cursing at him‑no not him, all the men who’d hurt him‑ and forcing him open wider and down on the bed harder.  Eventually he spent himself and collapsed.

He woke up strapped to the bed, blindfolded.  He panicked at first and then sagged. “Go ahead, I deserve it.”

“Why?”

“For hurting you.”

Jim giggled, “I’ve been hurt worse.”

“I hope you killed the bastard.”

“Bastards,” he corrected absently. “Some of them; one of them, I’m going to burn the heart out of before I kill him‑ if I do.”

“I… I didn’t want to HURT you.”

“You didn’t.”

“Then why?”

“I said, it’s your turn, and I don’t want you having a PTSD attack and killing me.”

Sebastian blinked behind his blindfold. “Oh.  Uh…”

“I won’t hurt you, but you might think I am,” Jim said gently, running a hand down his body from neck to crotch, softly. “Were any of them gentle?”

“No.”

“Good.  Some of mine were‑those are the worst.”  Then Jim started doing indescribably wonderful things to him.

He wasn’t used to sex like this, being helpless, except  with them, and he cried, and sometimes he panicked and screamed, but Jim just backed off slightly and went back to massaging him, or going down on him –which had no bad memories at all.

He spent time working him open, so much time.  By the time he had several fingers in him‑Sebastian didn’t know how many‑ he’d gone past screaming and twitching in fear to begging him for more.  They’d never done anything like this, never.

Jim pulled his fingers away.  He felt his cheeks being spread further apart and tensed, something warm and plastic-like pressed up to his asshole.

“Whr?”

Jim didn’t answer; he just started LICKING through it.  Then his fingers were back, and he was going down on Sebastian with his fingers inside him.  _God, I would KILL to get rid of the condom._

He must have said that out loud, because Jim chuckled and whispered, “You will.”

Some eternity later, he was begging Jim to let him come, to fuck him, “Please, please, fuck, please,” cut off in little panting gasps.

“Alright, Sebastian darling. Deep breath, it’s ok.  I won’t hurt you.”

Jim started moving his fingers in him slowly. His hand reached down and started stroking Sebastian while his fingers moved gently inside him in and out.

Jim pulled out, and Sebastian wailed.

“No, no, that’s enough for now, you were beautiful, you were wonderful.”  He slid a finger into him and hit just the right spot as his other hand stroked him off.

Jim held him until he stopped crying and cleaned him up.  He carefully untied him and slid the blindfold off. 

“Sebastian? I don’t want to give you a shot, but I think you need a tranquilizer. Can you take a pill?”

He nodded, and swallowed the pill with a bit of water.

Jim curled up against him, and Sebastian held onto him like a teddy bear and fell asleep.  For the first time since he was rescued, he didn’t have any nightmares.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> all chapter titles taken from the lyrics of "Unknown Soldier".


	3. Count me in, violent

He woke up to a platter of food and no Jim, but there was a note:

_Sebastian,_

_I have business to tend to.  You can read‑ask for new books by dialing 0‑ or exercise, and food will be delivered until I get back, but under NO circumstances do you leave the room unless someone brings you out._

_Jim_

The food was very good, and there was a pile of books.  He discovered a small bathroom was what he had assumed was a closet, and a quick look at the gun safe in the wall said it had better security than he was willing to tamper with. He did some exercises and sat down to read.

After a few hours there was a knock, and the door opened.  A very small woman stood in the doorway and held out a tray. She waved at the tray his breakfast had been on. They exchanged empty for full, and she left and closed the door.  She never spoke a word.

He was on his third tray of food, and second book, when Jim was the one who came in.

“Jim? Oh my GOD, what happened?”  Sebastian gaped at some truly impressive bruises, and Jim was holding one arm a bit stiffly.

He just looked puzzled. “What?  Nothing happened, I just had business.”

“Your face, your arm…” Sebastian waved at him as he got up and walked over.

Jim just looked up at him and started giggling, “Oh.  That was all YOU, Tiger.”

“You said I didn’t hurt you!”

Jim shrugged, “It was fun, and everything will heal.”

“I didn’t want‑“

“‑I know, its ok.”  Jim smiled and took him back to the bed and sat down. “How are YOU doing? We got further than I expected.”

“Fine. But... uh... where are my clothes?”

“They were filthy; also, you don’t need any for the week.”

“I’m staying… in here… naked… for a week?”

Jim nodded happily.

“You know you are… um…” _insane sprang to mind, but so did wonderful._

“Yes, I’m very um,” Jim grinned at him. “Now go get a condom, because you always fuck me first.”

Sebastian was getting one before his brain caught up. “I what?”

“You have conditioning that says BEING fucked is dangerous and bad, so you are going to ALWAYS fuck me first –until we get you past this anyway‑ so your subconscious knows I’m not a threat.”

You don’t actually get to be an officer without a lot of education, and Sebastian had basic psychology. “That makes a weirdly crazy kind of sense… except they weren’t conditioning me with sex.”

Jim smiled and stripped off the last of his clothes. “Yes they were.  Oh they may not have been doing it DELIBERATELY, but strong emotions, pain, and pleasure all work to condition someone. In your case fear and pain, and, from what you said, drugs.

“I’m pitting skill and pleasure against fear, drugs, and pain.  It would be easier if I could counterbalance the drugs, but‑“ Jim shrugged expressively, and lay back naked on the bed.

Sebastian’s hard-on wilted as he saw the bruises on Jim, especially the clear finger marks on his hips.

Jim patted the bed next to him. “Would you let me pull some blood for a blood test?”

Sebastian nodded.  Jim called out on the phone, and the door opened a few minutes later‑ Jim still nude‑ to a woman with medical supplies.  She took a few vials of blood and left.  By the time the door was closing Jim was already on his knees.  Whatever protest Sebastian was trying to form died under the blow job.

That night they just talked, in between the incredibly skilled tongue work by Jim. How had he been chained down? What had they done?  Sebastian had to admit he might have talked more to the Psychs on the base if there had been… benefits… like Jim’s mouth.

Jim left again in the morning; Sebastian doubted he’d slept.  A woman came to the door and held up a sign‑yes, a paper sign‑ that said “Shower?”  He nodded, she gave him shower shoes, and she escorted him out to the shower and back.  She never answered any of his questions.

Jim came back after the second tray of food this time. This time he only restrained one of Sebastian’s wrists when it was his turn. He mostly fingered him until he came screaming Jim’s name.

Three days later, Jim came inside him for the first time, as Sebastian‑completely at liberty‑ knelt on the bed.

The next day, after some truly mind-blowing fucking with Sebastian on top, Jim fucked him while he was restrained. In between, he talked to him about what had happened, and calmed him down or rewarded him with blow jobs.

_Military therapy could go take a flying leap._

Sebastian guessed it had been a week, although he couldn’t be sure, when Jim came back after business and said, “Sebastian, I need to ask you something.”

“Anything, Jim.”

“Would you feel better if you could get at the bastard who did this to you?”

Sebastian snorted. “Of course.”

He handed him a folder.  It was the military file on his mission, plus a lot of intel that NO ONE should have.  There were photos of where he had been held, and a few surveillance photos of the cold bastard… with a name.

Sebastian’s mouth had gone dry. “Where did you get this? HOW did you get this?”

“I won’t tell you… yet.” Jim sat down across his lap‑ it felt weird with him being dressed‑ and started tonguing at his neck. “I could use a man like you, Sebastian Moran, and not JUST in bed.  Come work for me.”

“Doing what?”

“Well, the first thing would be killing him.”

“And then?”

“You’re very good at killing people, and setting up security.  Besides, wouldn’t you be horribly bored as a civilian?”

“I get the feeling this is the deal with the devil people talk about.”

“It is‑ or maybe with the faeries.”  Jim stood up. He took a long forgotten syringe out of his pocket.  He then put a different syringe down next to it. “I promised you a week.  You’ve made progress, you can get better, and I guarantee you that you won’t be bored… or you can throw it away.”  Jim stood up and walked to the door. “Just hit the intercom if you decide in my favor.”

“Wait.”

Jim turned and looked at him.

“If… If I go to work for you, what does that mean for…”

“For us? For sex?”

Sebastian nodded.

“Once your blood test is clear‑ assuming it is‑ you don’t need a condom with me.  You will never have sex again with anyone I don’t approve, and you will use a condom with them unless I expressly give permission.  If someone forces you, or there’s a good reason, then you just go back to condoms until you’re clear. If you do anything idiotic like get drunk and fuck someone who isn’t cleared, you get quarantined for three months and you get nothing.” Jim looked thoughtful. “LIE to me and I do things to you that you don’t want to contemplate.”

Sebastian sat back and blinked. “That’s… eerily detailed and specific.”

“I plan ahead; I’m good at it.”

“I… I don’t know. I know I don’t want to die anymore.  I know I want to kill him,” he said waving at the file.

Jim looked at him for a while, and picked up the syringes. “I’ll give you that one, then. Call it a field test.  Just don’t fuck anyone‑“ Jim grinned, “that way.”  He then looked at the cold man’s photo, and back up at Sebastian. “Alright, him. But use a condom.”

“I do NOT want to fuck him.”

Jim shrugged, “If you change your mind, use a condom.  Otherwise, may I suggest a rifle barrel?”

Sebastian froze at the idea, torn between really wanting to do that and horror.

“Come on, you’ll need clothes.”

“Why do I get the feeling guns and so on aren’t a problem?”

“Because you’re smart.”

Within six hours he was on a plane heading back to Hell, with a new name on his identification, and a contact to meet.

Two days later he was with a team of people he didn’t trust, with better weapons than he’d had going in with his team.

A week after that, a base was in flames, and the cold man was chained to a metal bed.

“You know, I have full permission to fuck you,” Sebastian said looking down at him.  He had a lot of bullets lodged in him, and he probably wouldn’t live, but he was still conscious right now.

The cold man snarled out the local word for faggot.

Sebastian shrugged. “I don’t actually want to fuck you, much to my surprise. I thought I would, but I do want one thing… I want you to suffer.  I don’t have time to shoot you up and bring you down, unfortunately; still, I can do one thing that feels about the same.”

He poured gasoline over his wounds and dropped a match on him.  “Not so cold now.”


	4. Holding on too tight

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> ouch   
> TW for canon typical violence and references to pedophilia and criminal activities (past events)

He went back to London and called Jim.

“Have a good time?”

“Yes, I did.”

“Made a decision?”

“I still think this is a bad idea, but yes, I’ll work for you.”

“It’s a horrible idea, Sebastian, but you’ll enjoy it.  My driver will meet you.”

And just like that, Sebastian Moran was swept up in the whirlwind.  _Jim was terrifying, brilliant, and insane, but oh, it was magic to watch his mind at work_.  The sex was incredible, and when his blood tests came back clear for three months, and he could ditch the condoms, it got even better.

And he found out Jim had nightmares, and times when his eyes got dull and he wouldn’t answer, but could be steered around if he trusted you. Sometimes he came back to himself as though he’d just been lost in thought, but sometimes he came back to himself violent and dangerous.

Sebastian wondered what had happened to him, but wasn’t certain he could ask.

Then one day, Jim said something about   going out, and picked Sebastian as his bodyguard, telling him only not to interfere unless called on.  He rumpled his hair, and dressed like a boffin‑ _like he had when I first saw him, actually_ ‑ and went to a university and met some professor, and they went out for dinner.  They were friends, Sebastian could tell, and when they went back to an ordinary apartment, and Jim fell into his arms, and it was clear they were more than friends, Sebastian saw red.

He waited until the next day, after business was done and they were alone. He had just finished growling something about “not seeing him again,” when the world spun crazily and he felt the world go black‑felt it, because his eyes had already closed.

He woke up chained by his wrists to a ring in the floor.  Sebastian recognized the room: it was remote, and soundproofed.

“Oh good, you’re awake.”  Jim had his friendly, professional voice on: the one that sounded sane and did very bad things to people.

“Jim?”

“Sir,” Jim corrected.

“Jim, what’s going‑“ he cut off in a scream as something slashed across his back.

“Sir,” Jim corrected again, voice unruffled and calm‑dangerously calm.

Sebastian put his head down to the floor and said, “Sir.”

“Do you know why you’re here?”

“No, Sir.”

“You’re here because I actually like you, Sebastian, and I’m going to give you a second chance.”

“I… I don’t understand, Sir.”

“I told you once that I knew what it was like… being hurt, being raped.  Do you remember?”

“Yes, Sir.” Sebastian wasn’t going to pick his head up.  He’d never even imagined Jim in one of those coldly, calmly murderous moods aimed at him.  He’d only seen it once, and Jim had taken the guy apart with a knife, piece by piece. Admittedly the guy was a pedophile and deserved it, but Jim had never raised his voice, never flinched.  The guards had all left before he was done, including Sebastian, to be sick.

“I was handed over to be trained, Sebastian.  The way that man I took apart trained people, for his movies, and his friends.” _And how the living hell did Jim know what he was thinking, oh God… Jim? Jim had been?_

“How do you think I learned to be so very, very good in bed, Sebastian?” Jim’s voice was a dark whisper crawling around the base of his spine.

“I… I didn’t know.” Sebastian felt sick. “I just thought you were.”

“Hmmm…”  Jim walked over and put a hand on Sebastian’s shoulder, and moved it closer to the painful lash‑ _and that’s what it had been, a whip_. “I used to belong to someone, Sebastian.”

“You?” He felt the fingers digging in and added, “Sir?” quickly.

“Yes. I’m going to burn the heart out of him, destroy everything he loves, and leave him nothing but ashes.”  Jim said it like he was discussing the weather.

“Yes, Sir,” Sebastian nodded into the floor.

“I am no one’s possession, Sebastian.  Not yours, either.”

And suddenly he realized what had angered him so much, when he tried to tell him not to see that man…

“I’m very sorry, Sir. I was… I was…”‑ he finally decided on an answer‑ “out of line.”

“Yes. Yes you were.”

“Please forgive me, it will never happen again.”

“As I said, Sebastian, I like you. That’s why you get a second chance.” Keys clinked in the restraints; Sebastian breathed again when they came off, but didn’t get up.

“Stay there and take it,” Jim said calmly.

“Yes, Sir.”

The lash hit him again, and he clenched his fists and fought down the need to move, or fight. It hit him a few more times‑ he wasn’t counting. 

Eventually, Jim said, “Get up.”

“Y-Yes, Sir,” he panted, and managed after a few tries to get to his feet.

Jim was standing there holding what looked like an electric cord. “Hurts, doesn’t it?”

“Yes, Sir, it does.”

“My father used one to beat me,” he said mildly. “I rather thought it hurt more than the other things he did; of course, you never admit that.”

“Your FATHER?”

Jim just looked at him, “You’re on suspension for three months.  You will do your job, and follow the rules.  After that, we’ll see.”

“Yes, Sir… Thank you.”  Sebastian looked at the madman and realized he couldn’t go back to living without him, he just couldn’t. “I’m sorry I spoiled your night out, Sir.”

Jim raised an eyebrow at him and nodded slowly.

Three months passed achingly slowly.  Sebastian tried to take his mind off it with one of the approved people, but he couldn’t; he just lost himself in books and movies.  It cut him somewhere inside to watch Jim going about his work, and never seeing him as anything but the boss.  He hadn’t realized what he was losing.

Three months later, Jim took him into his private quarters. “Can you be with me, Sebastian, and not be jealous?”

Sebastian knew enough not to lie to him. “I don’t know if I can not BE jealous, Sir. You’re… you’re incredible, but I can behave better.”

Jim considered. “I suppose that’s fair.  I advise you to try to get over it, because sex is one more tool in my arsenal. They tried to turn me into a toy‑they just gave me another weapon.”

“You used it to help me,” Sebastian nodded.

“Yes.”  Then he smiled, and his shoulders rolled back, and it was JIM again. “So, it’s been three months, do you want to apologize?”

Sebastian spent the night apologizing as best he could.

*

MI6 recruitment briefings were becoming intensely painful for the few staff old enough to remember when M was something other than the old M’s assistant –and bodyguard. It was the eerie stillness that bothered people, the utter icy calm under most circumstances that turned into an icy rage that threatened to freeze you to your bones.  Only a handful of people recognized what had been, once, the hallmark of OO3, the deadliest sniper in MI6 history, and before that another history. Fewer each year.

“Where is the follow-up report on Sebastian Moran?” M asked, after she’d gone through  the files, pulling some from the red Not Recommended for  further review, and tossing so many from the blue files aside.

“Who?”

“Sebastian Moran.  Sniper. He was in the file two years ago as a prospect. I told you to leave him in the army to mature a bit.  He should be up for review.”

She refused to adjourn the meeting until they found his file, and then she blistered paint.

“Discharged?!  Sent back as a civilian? Whose damned fool idea was that?!”

“He was captured, Ma’am. Tortured, raped, and drugged.”

“Was he still physically fit?”

“Well, the doctors thought he would recover, Ma’am, but psychologically damaged… and with a drug issue and the‑“

“FIND HIM.”

A month of scrambling led to two people turning in their resignations rather than hand her the reports. 

She looked through the reports, slowly, and the temperature in the room dropped steadily, judging from the shivering of everyone else.

“So,” she said quietly, calmly, her voice light and even. “He was sent home, and vanished.  A perfect recruit who just needed a bit of the softness taken off of him, and you let him get away.” She smiled pleasantly, “You don’t even know what happened to him.”

“No, Ma’am.”

“I do.”

She pulled a file out and threw it on the table, then brought up copies of it on the screen.  There were records of a smuggling base going up in flames, no survivors ‑of a body found burned beyond anything but dental records, left chained to a bed.

“Someone else got to him,” M said steadily. “He’s been picked up by someone who offered him what we should have, and now they have him, and we don’t even know where.

“Keep a quiet look out for him. And if you lose another one like this, I’ll have your skins tacked to my wall.  Dismissed.”

 

**Author's Note:**

> Title, and chapter titles: Unknown Soldier by Breaking Bad
> 
> PLEASE understand that while flooding, exposure and desensitization are all valid psychological concepts, this is utterly unapproved methodology for rape counseling. Moriarty doesnt usually worry about someone filing a complaint, since if it didnt work out....
> 
> in other words, if you need counseling or assistance, please get it from someone who knows what they're doing, but not from someone recruiting for his underworld killing team.


End file.
